Hurt (DS Lucy Black) (34 page)

Wilson nodded. ‘I’d assume so.’

‘And Gary Duffy was put in the frame to take him off the picture?’

‘Arresting him for terrorist activity would simply have strengthened his reputation, strengthened his position in the community.’

‘Label him a paedophile, though, and he’ll be ostracized,’ Lucy said.

‘Presumably.’

‘Why not give Gant back his daughter’s body?’ Lucy asked.

Her mother remained silent. Lucy studied the circling floral pattern of the carpet beneath her feet, piecing it together. ‘Because then there’d have been forensics that Gary Duffy could have challenged in court, that would have implicated Logue’s son,’ she said, turning to look at her mother.

If the woman heard the comment, she did not react.

‘So what role did you play in all this? Was this how you were groomed for success? Turning a blind eye?’

‘No,’ Wilson said, looking at Lucy directly for the first time. ‘The case was taken off me. I was a young officer, told to hand over what I had. I simply did as I was told.’

‘And what happened to Bell? Jackie Logue told me he’d had a son that he’d lost when the boy was a teenager. I assumed he meant the child had died.’

Wilson shook her head. ‘He and his mother were forced to move away and change their names to Bell. In the hope that he wouldn’t reoffend.’

‘Because that’s worked so well in the past,’ Lucy spat. ‘You knew —’

‘I knew nothing for certain, Lucy,’ Wilson said sharply. ‘Nor do you.’

‘You. You and your ... secrets.’

Wilson’s mouth tightened as she sat more erect. ‘We all have secrets, Lucy. That’s what happened. Doing deals with bad people to try to do some good. On all sides.’

‘And that justifies it?’

‘That Finn girl went missing and you could go into that community to investigate it, without fear of being shot. Because of those deals. That’s the price we pay for peace.’

‘So what will happen to Jackie Logue now?’

‘If he was involved in this ring, he’ll face charges,’ Wilson said. ‘If he wasn’t, he won’t.’

‘About Louisa Gant, I mean?’

‘Nothing. He didn’t do it. Peter Bell will face charges if any forensics taken from her remains implicate him.’

‘Jackie Logue’s an accessory.’

Wilson dismissed the statement. ‘So too is Special Branch then. And every officer who benefited from our having Logue on the ground, arguing on our behalf.’

‘That’s rubbish,’ Lucy muttered.

‘Don’t you judge me. Not until you’re able to make the hard decisions too.’

‘John Gant deserved to know the truth about his daughter. That’s not a hard decision. The man’s living in a museum,’ Lucy said, aware as she said it that Gant was not the only one refusing to let go of past grief. Was the picture of Mary Quigg, pinned to her office wall, any different from Gant looking at E-FIT images of the girl his daughter might have grown up to be? ‘He deserves the truth,’ Lucy repeated.

‘Well now he’ll get it. Some of it at least,’ Wilson said.

‘A father deserves to know who killed his child,’ Lucy stated. ‘It doesn’t matter the cost.’

Wilson shook her head and stood. ‘Go back to Derry and get changed. Get that wound on your face checked.’

Lucy borrowed one of the squad cars that had come down from Derry. It was after ten in the morning by the time she left the house. She reached the front of Magilligan and parked up on the verge where she had sat the night before when they had waited for Bell.

Just after 10.45 a.m., the front gates swung slowly backwards and a single figure stepped out into the watery sunlight, his hand raised above his eyes as he glanced up and down the roadway. A little distance down the road, there was a bus stop and he started walking towards it, hefting his bag onto his shoulder.

As he drew abreast the car, Lucy leaned across and opened the door. Eoghan Harkin leaned down.

‘Officer,’ he said. ‘Whatever it was, I didn’t do it. I’ve only just got out.’

‘I thought I should give you a lift,’ Lucy said. ‘We should talk.’

Harkin looked up and down, as if judging whether there were any potentially better offers, then nodded and, pushing his bag over the shoulder rest onto the floor of the back seat, got in.

Lucy went to first Mass on Christmas morning. The air was sharp with the promise of coming snow, despite the sky being clear of cloud. The other parishioners smiled at her and offered her a Happy Christmas. She returned the wishes, even as she struggled to feel the joy they should have carried with them.

After Mass, she drove to see her father. She had dug out a picture of the garden with the fountain from the laneway behind Prehen and had it framed. When he unwrapped it, he smiled and thanked her, but she could tell from the blankness in his expression that he did not recognize the place. Another of his memories had passed beyond him forever, the wisps of her childhood diminishing one by one with each day his illness progressed.

‘What’s this for?’ he asked.

‘It’s Christmas, Daddy,’ she said.

‘I’ve not got you anything,’ he said, his eyes rheumy.

‘That’s OK,’ she said.

She sat next to him, her hand on the arm of her chair, his hand, soft and warm, lightly balanced on top of hers.

‘Are we having dinner?’ her father asked suddenly.

‘No, Daddy,’ Lucy said. ‘I’ve got to go soon.’

‘Where to?’

‘The cemetery,’ Lucy said.

The man snorted, derisively. ‘What’s a young girl like you doing going to visit the dead?’

Lucy stared at him, surprised by the lucidity of the comment.

‘You want to take Lucy somewhere nice today, love,’ he said, winking against the light coming in through the window of his room.

‘I am Lucy, Daddy.’

He squinted at her, then patted her hand lightly. ‘Isn’t that funny? I thought you were your mother for a minute,’ he said.

As she was leaving, Lucy was surprised to see her mother’s car pull into the small car park in front of the block where her father was being held. In truth, she had assumed that the woman did not visit her father. She moved quickly across to the squad car that she was using until her own was replaced, but struggled to get the door open, her movements clumsy because of the bandage on her hand. By the time she’d managed to pull it open, she had no choice but to speak to her.

Her mother approached, walking crisply across the scattered leaves that blew around their feet.

‘Happy Christmas, Lucy,’ she said.

‘And you,’ Lucy said. They leaned awkwardly towards one another, briefly pressing their cheeks lightly together.

‘I didn’t know you visited him,’ Lucy said.

‘Well, I do.’

‘He’s not well,’ she said, unnecessarily.

Her mother nodded absently. She glanced around, pulling her coat tighter around her against the bracing wind. ‘So, what are your plans for the day?’

‘I’ll see Robbie. Then Tom Fleming asked me to help out with a soup kitchen he works in for the homeless and that. Part of his Christian group.’

‘You could call for some dinner later with me, if you wanted,’ her mother said. ‘I’m having some friends around. But you’d still be welcome.’

Lucy smiled. ‘Thanks, but I’m OK.’

‘You’d rather eat with the homeless?’

‘I’ve things to do,’ Lucy said, suddenly pained that she had inadvertently offended the woman.

‘On Christmas Day?’

Lucy shrugged. ‘It’s just a day,’ she said, feeling her eyes fill. The gash on her cheek, stitched up a few nights previous, throbbed angrily.

‘I see,’ her mother said. ‘I’ll go on.’

Lucy nodded and turned to fumble with her car keys again.

‘Oh, we found Jackie Logue last night,’ her mother said, turning on her step.

‘Really?’ Lucy asked. Logue had vanished soon after his son, Peter Bell, had been arrested in Magilligan. They’d assumed someone had tipped him off that the PSNI would be coming for him. ‘Where’s he being held?’

‘The morgue. He’d been stripped naked and shot in the head. His body was laid out on the train tracks where they found Karen Hughes.’

‘That’s ... terrible,’ Lucy said, aware of how insincere the words sounded.

‘Yes. Eoghan Harkin gets out of prison, Logue goes missing, then he’s murdered on the spot where Harkin’s daughter was found. You’d swear someone had told Harkin that Logue was involved in Karen’s death.’

Lucy felt the wound in her face throb again.

‘And you were so moralistic,’ her mother said.

‘I don’t know what you mean,’ Lucy mumbled, her face flushing.

‘You were spotted picking up Harkin outside the prison. What did you tell him?’

Lucy shook her head but said nothing.

Her mother stepped closer to her again. ‘I put you in PPU because I didn’t think you’d be able to handle the politics of CID. I thought you were better than that. It seems I was wrong.’ She regarded Lucy a moment coldly, as if appraising her anew. ‘You’re more like than me than you want to admit.’

With that, she turned and strode off. Lucy stood watching her, her face so hot and sore, she felt as though she had been slapped.

Robbie was eating his own dinner when Lucy went in. He smiled as she entered the room, leaning towards her to accept her kiss.

‘Merry Christmas,’ he said.

Lucy smiled, sitting on the bed next to him. ‘How are you feeling?’

‘Sore,’ he said. ‘But I’ll recover.’

Lucy took his hand in hers, was reminded in the gesture of the feeling of her father’s hand earlier.

‘I am sorry, Robbie. For this. And for us, too.’

He smiled sadly. ‘I know, Lucy.’

‘I’d rather it had been me,’ she said. ‘You didn’t deserve all this.’

He shrugged. ‘I’m glad it wasn’t you,’ he said.

‘When do you get out?’ Lucy asked, embarrassed by his comment.

‘The next day or two,’ he said. ‘I’m going to go home for a while. To my folks.’

‘Do you want me to give you a lift up? I’ll check under the car before you get into it this time,’ Lucy said.

‘And so you should,’ Robbie joked. ‘No. My dad’s going to collect me.’

Lucy swallowed, shifting on the bed. ‘Will I see you over the holidays at all?’

Robbie looked at her, his eyes soft in their kindness. ‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘I’m not sure what’s happening.’

‘With the holidays or with us?’ Lucy said, trying to smile, pretending indifference.

‘Both,’ he said. ‘Either. I’m not sure.’

Lucy patted his hand with hers, then lifted it again and, clasping it between both hers, drew it to her lips and kissed the skin between his finger and thumb.

‘I am sorry,’ she repeated.

* * *

She didn’t go to the cemetery in the end. Instead she found herself once more on Petrie Way, glancing in the mirror at the wrapped gift that sat on the back seat of the car as she pulled up outside the house.

She sat, watching the house, wondering whether she should leave the gift at all. Perhaps wait until the sky darkened and then leave it on the doorstep. But she knew they would never give it to the child, not knowing whence it came.

Finally, she got out, clutching the gift in her hand. She made it as far as the driveway of the house before stopping. Through the large front window she could see, in the lounge, the Kelly family sitting on the floor. Joe sat at the centre of a scattered collection of new toys, his foster mother helping him play with a truck while her husband recorded it.

Lucy could see, for the first time, how happy the child looked, how content was the whole family. She knew that, if she knocked at the door, left her gift, she would have to explain how she knew the child and why she felt responsible for him. She would have to share Mary’s sacrifice with them. She knew that the knowledge of what had happened to him would profit none of them. In the end, she turned to leave.

Across the street, a neighbour was standing at his car, watching her. ‘Are you looking for someone?’ he called over.

‘No,’ Lucy said. ‘I’ve the wrong house,’ she explained, moving back to her car.

Around four she went to the soup kitchen where Tom Fleming was working. She helped them to prepare the meals for the homeless. As she helped laying the tables, she watched out for Janet, the girl who had featured so prominently in Lucy’s own father’s past. The last time Lucy had seen her she had been living on the street, an alcoholic, abandoned by her own family. Lucy hoped and feared, in equal measure, that Janet might appear at the soup kitchen for food, but she did not.

After the dinner, she and Fleming stood in the kitchen of the church hall, drinking coffee.

‘Pudding?’ Fleming asked, offering her a dish.

Lucy shook her head. ‘I’m stuffed.’

‘I’m not allowed it,’ Fleming said, putting the dish down a little ruefully. ‘Because of the brandy. In case it sets me off on another bender,’ he added with a smirk.

‘How is it going?’ Lucy asked.

‘I’m OK,’ he said, smiling lightly. ‘I had to dry out for a few days. It was a little hairy, but ... it’s done now.’

Lucy nodded. ‘I did tell them you didn’t miss that stuff in Kay’s. I told them it was planted.’

Fleming patted her arm. ‘I know,’ he said. ‘Your mother told me. But she was right, Lucy. I needed a break, to sort myself out. I wasn’t doing anyone any favours, the state I was in.’

‘Are you OK now?’

He nodded. ‘I will be,’ he said. ‘I heard about the attack on your car. Are
you
OK?’

Lucy nodded, busying herself with rinsing her cup. ‘Robbie was the one who was hurt.’

‘You’re not having dinner with your mum today?’

Lucy shook her head. ‘No. I must feel more at home here, I guess,’ she said, looking around at the ragged dinner guests sitting before her.

‘You and me both,’ Fleming said, putting his arm around her shoulders and briefly pulling her close. ‘Happy Christmas, Lucy.’

‘And you, Tom.’

She drove down through the Waterside on her way home. As she passed the shops at Gobnascale, she glanced across. They were closed for the day, their shutters pulled. Despite that, a group of kids still gathered outside them, standing in a loose circle.

As she slowed to glance across, Lucy saw a car sitting in the parking bay opposite, the door open, the owner sitting half out of the car, watching over the group, a cigarette in his hand.